Magical Drop III

"Too many balloons remind me of my ex"

While the Neo-Geo library consists mainly of fighting games, there is a also a large number of puzzle games present on the console. Among these, the most popular is the Puzzle Bobble series (Bust-a-Move) and a lot of titles strived to be as good but failed due to lack of innovation. Gmaes like Minnsan, Money Idol Exchanger or Gururin made the genre lose its marks gradually as more crap titles came out in quick succession. Until the Magical Drop series saw the light of day, that is.

Magical Drop 3 is the last in the series and thus, the developers tried to make it the best out of the three. This explains the profusion of modes in the game : Survival, Challenge and Magical Journey. Okay, I know that's only 3 but that's a lot for a MVS puzzle game, my friend. As a matter of fact, the modes are rather self-explanatory.

The principle still consists of neatly gathering 3 balloons of the same color to have them disappear. However, your character - a clown - can move and as he does so, press A to carry balloons. You may then move away to a row where you'll release the balloon and you just need to press B to do so. You can carry as many balloons of the same color as you want although as you become familiar with the game, you will realize that this isn't really such an important mission.

Survival Mode is meant to give the game more replay value in the advent that you are good enough to complete the other modes rather quickly. It gets more difficult with each subsequent puzzle and getting through the last ones without having your hair turn white shows true dexterity. Or it could also be that you died beforehand. There is also a wanna-be plot with a nice little surprise if you manage to beat it, which isn't that obvious.

Challenge mode is the typical player versus CPU one where you can brush up your skills against an easy AI at the beginning and freakingly difficult ones if you are good enough to progress. The matches just go on in this mode and never let you rest. Beginners should start with this mode since the first levels are extremely easy and allow the player to become more familiar with the controls. You can also learn helpful tips in this mode to be able to tackle the perilous Magical Journey.

The real interest is the Magical Journey which is way better than the Story Mode of Puzzle Bobble 2. Upon choosing your character out of the quite wide cast, you'll be set to travel across a huge screen with a lot of stages. However, the innovative part is that instead of just moving on to the next level as you would normally do, Magical Drop 3 is like a board game in that according to where you drop, you may get bonuses.

You also meet the other characters and have to battle against them in a ruthless match to be able to move on. The game thus also consists of small cutscenes with your character talking to the rest and the designs during these are simply marvellous. But sadly, the dialogues never change and get ultimately boring after a while and you'll very likely skip those. Beating some of them is quite hard to as they do 7 string-combos to make things even more difficult for you.

Among the bonuses, there are the infamous ''Move back 2 spaces'' or ''Move forward 3 spaces'' although there are new specific ones like ''The balloons got mixed'', and it's up to you to see to that crazy situation. Each bonus is represented by a picture, some of which can get downright funny. The black bird which annoyingly pops up to tell you that ''The balloons got mixed'' looks a lot like Miss Tick's Algorab and will make you laugh a few time with its stupid look.

There are also Special Stages throughout your quest, although I still haven't figured out how they are different from the rest. This mode is quite difficult and will have you hooked on for days if you're a newbie to the genre. And the 4 credits that you always get in NG ports are really not enough to beat the game as you'll lose after just 4 puzzles and have to continue.

Magical Drop's graphics are really surprising for this relatively old game. Everything in the game is in anime style with cute characters and flashy nut great colors. Instead of the usual dull backgrounds, MD goes further and instead carries lively and detailed backgrounds. Castles, animals or just a beautiful landscape will make you drool as you try to pull out combos to get rid of the opponent.

In versus mode, the characters can be seen behind the balloons and these are simply brilliant. They are very different from the view in Magical Journey - which are a bit lame - and as they show how they feel after winning or losing, one can't help but feel how rich this game is in graphics. You'll see your character crying, Fool (not you, that's the name of a character) destroying everything around him and even tits bouncing -- a little more and this game would be just plain erotic.

Too bad the music seems to have been neglected though. Only 2 different themes for the entire game is a stupid idea and this gets particularly annoying after some time. Thankfully, the sound effects of your characters and the balloons bursting is well done and the seiyuu is excellent too. The announcer is a real blast but it would have helped to hear him more - as it is, you even have to raise the volume a lot or he will just go unnoticed.

Magical Drop 3 also benefits from an excellent gameplay with its 3 modes. However, with practice and as the player gets better with each match, the game becomes somewhat too easy and thus lacks replay value. Even at the hardest difficulty, it loses its appeal after some time simply because you will be like a god compared to the CPU. Of course, the best thing then is to invite a friend over for a whole day of balloon-bursting.

As it is, this game is particularly sweet in versus mode and is always fun. This is made even better by its cute graphics and the top-notch control contributes to make it a nice game. It is not as good as Bust-a-Move but manages to innovate with its new modes although the game principle is still quite similar. Worth a try but be warned that it will suck all your spare time for a couple of weeks !

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 01/25/02, Updated 11/09/02